


Start As You Mean To Go On

by Tabithian



Series: A Glitch in the System [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-13
Updated: 2012-06-13
Packaged: 2017-11-07 15:15:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/432557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabithian/pseuds/Tabithian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His parents go to Haiti and only one comes back. It's nothing more than a roll of the dice, twist of fate, and where there were two now only one remains.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place before [A Glitch in the System](http://archiveofourown.org/works/431191), before Tim was Glitch, before he was Red X.

Tim's father is a good enough man. (Who is to judge what makes a man good, and to what extent? What unit of measure is used for such a thing?) He loves his family, he loves his friends. He loves the world, inasmuch as someone can. He loves his life, his career. He loves all of that, and yet. And yet. (That he forgets, neglects one or the other at times is nothing new, nothing strange. Everyone does it, even if they fail to see it as such.)

Tim's mother is a good enough woman. (Again, who is to judge what makes a woman good, and to what extent? What unit of measure is used for such a thing?) She loves her family, she loves her friends. She loves the world, inasmuch as someone can. She loves her life, her career. She loves all of that, and yet. And yet. ( _"The world is a harsh place, my love, it holds no place for fairness."_ )

His parents go to Haiti and only one comes back. It's nothing more than a roll of the dice, twist of fate, and where there were two now only one remains.

His father, his mother, both loving and loved. His father shows him the past, (learn it now, or regret it later when old mistakes are made new). His mother shows him not the present, nor the future. She shows him instead the key to both (look, watch, learn, know what is going on in the world, and it is yours for the taking). 

The world is unfair, and Tim knows this, has known it for as long as he can remember, although he did not always realize it as such. Too young, too innocent to think in terms of disappointment, bitterness, resentment.

The world is unfair, and it is _greedy_. Forever taking and taking and taking. (A pacifier lost to gravity, out of the reach of his small arms. A treasured toy, ragged and falling apart, taken away never to be seen again. His parents, again and again and again to the world, to their jobs, the lives they had before he came along. Gotham's nights and Knights, her Bats. One who left of his own accord, and one who was taken by force, by the world's cruelties, her greed.)

Through it all, one thing stays bright, clear. A truth, cold for all it that it was meant in kindness. ( _"Money, power, both are fleeting. Knowledge, my son, that is the key. Know what is going on the world, and it is yours for the taking._ )

Look, watch, learn. (Robin is Dick Grayson becomes Batman is Bruce Wayne becomes Robin is Jason Todd becomes aching grief and dark anger for such a loss.) 

Know what is going on in the world. (Gotham is bigger, crueler by far than her Knights, her Bats, cruel and greedy like the world, her mother. She takes and takes and takes, and they are but human. Something must be done. Something is needed.)

And it is yours for the taking. (In order to take, there must be something given, something offered. A childhood, his. What good has it done him? Days spent waiting for his parents to come home, home a place cold and empty with only him to occupy it. Nights spent chasing after Gotham's Knights, her Bats, to see them brought low because they are human, so very human.)

Tim's father showed him the past, his mother showed him the key to the present, the future. Gotham's Knights, her Bats, showed him. What did they show him? Hope that things can be better? How cruel the world can be? (Yes. No. Both. Neither.)

Tim's father, slowly recovering, weak in body and spirit. Tim's mother, dead. 

An inauspicious beginning, but. Tim has learned things, so many things. His parents traveled the world, and could not in good conscience leave him at home alone all that time. Boarding schools seemed a good idea, sure to build character. (In a way, they did, although perhaps not quite the way they'd hoped. The world is vast, and there are things to be learned no classroom will ever teach.)

There are thieves in the world, inevitable. There are thieves in the world, and they are clever, cunning, dangerous. There are thieves in the world, and the things they steal vary from thief to thief (gold, jewelry, money, knowledge). 

Gotham doesn't need another Knight, a Bat, a beacon of hope no matter how shrouded in shadows it is. (She will only break it, crush it like all the others.) Gotham needs. Gotham needs knowledge, information, someone willing to take in order to give, to give in order to take. Gotham needs a _thief_. 

"Hello, kitten."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gotham is no place for thieves now, not with her Knights broken, lost, so lost. Angry, hurting, looking to hurt back.

Selina is not the first he goes to, but she is Gothams's best, her brightest thief, for all that she loves the shadows almost as much as the Bats. He's seen her before, or she's seen him, of course. (Small as he is, he's just a boy, untrained. Of course someone would see.)

She doesn't ask why, only, “Are you sure?” There's a strange sort of sadness to it, even as she smiles. (Thieves, for all that the world, Gotham, loves them, are still thieves.) “Kitten, are you sure?”

He's not, no. Of all the paths to choose, why this one? Gotham treats her champions, her Knights poorly, cruelly. Her thieves, little better, but. Her Knights are floundering, lost, and there is little he can do for them as he is. (He is not sure his heart is strong enough to become one of her Knights, but a thief. Stealing through the night like a secret, _yes_.)

“Yes.”

Gotham is no place for thieves now, not with her Knights broken, lost, so lost. Angry, hurting, looking to hurt back.

“Later, kitten, later.” A smile, full of promise. “We'll be back.”

She takes him to another city, kinder than Gotham, brighter. Full of treasures for the taking and lessons to be learned. This, a building to be scaled. That a roof to cross. There a lock to be picked. Here a safe to be cracked. 

Small lessons that build and build. He learns. Bit by bit he learns. How to stay hidden. (First, next, last, always.) How to be silent. (A skill he was already adept at, but now he is better.) How to move. (A thief is a thief, but Gotham is dangerous, unkind. A thief is a thief, quick and clever, but a thief must also know how to defend against enemies, those that seek to do them harm.) How to tell a lie that seems to be truth. (Something he was skilled at before, but now he is so much better.)

He learns other things because Selina is not without her kindnesses. Confidence lost now returned, the warmth of laughter for the sake of it, that family is not bound by blood. (He thought he knew this, but Selina _shows_ him with everything she does.) He learns and learns and learns, time passing like the blink of an eye, and always in the back of his mind is _Gotham_ , dark and beautiful.

He is always there, in some small part. Gotham laid claim to him the moment he took his first breath, opened his eyes to her. He knows she's found another Knight, young, reckless, _dangerous_. A new Robin, bright and beautiful, and Gotham will break her, crush her if she is not careful. (So few are.) 

“Kitten.” Not his name, no, but what she calls him. (To name a thing, to give it a name makes it real, makes it yours, and she knows he's not hers for the keeping.)

“Catwoman.” Her name, yes, but not all she is. 

Selina smiles at him, sharp and dangerous. “Gotham's calling.”

She is, siren song and death knell (Gotham is already ancient, and greedy, so greedy, none of her favored children will survive her) in one.

He smiles back, not ready, not fully, but he has spent enough time away. (His father thinks boarding school, and the highest education he could have. Selina thinks prime hunting grounds for their prey, life is the best teacher.)

He has no name, none, for Gotham. (She has her Batman, her Robin, her Batgirl, now Oracle. She has her Joker, her Two-Face, her Penguin. She has her Catwoman, and now, if she will have it, she has him. Nameless and unknown, a phantom, a wraith.)

There is no guarantee Gotham will accept him, welcome him home. She is familiar with her Bats, has cautiously accepted her Birds. He is neither, and yet. And yet.

Gotham is calling.


End file.
